The Immortal Heinz
by jcdenton2012
Summary: The Death Korps of Krieg contain many fine soldiers, but one in particular has earned a notorious reputation as the "Immortal Heinz."
1. Chapter 1

"Hold the Line! Artillery and mortars concentrate on the center! Let no Ork pass!" yelled the Watchmaster through his gas mask, saber raised towards the heavens and pointed beyond the trenches towards the rushing greenskin infantry. On his order Lucius 88 Lasguns topped the trenches with mounted bayonets and sighted the enemy infantry for long range sharpshooting. The Orks fell by the hundreds as Götterdämmerung Howitzers lined up in artillery pits behind the main defensive breastworks ruthlessly bombarded shell after shell into the no-mans-land beyond the crest of the siege lines.

As the artillery fire continued with ruthless carnage upon the Orks the greenskins brought forward their real threat. Guardsmen felt the soil tremble beneath their feet before they say it. Scouts had reported this advancing metallic monster hours before the battle and already the men of Krieg knew the horrors soon to be ventured upon them

The assembled Death Korps Guardsmen nodded in approval behind their trenches, some probably smiling behind their iconic gas masks, as the Ork Great Gargant lumbered forward step by agonizingly slow step.

"It is truly a great day to die for his lordship," said one Death Korp Grenadier as he popped up out of the trench to strafe a jogging Ork mid-trot. The soldiers standing by his side nodded in approval and then continued firing at the Greenskin Horde. Ork Warbikes drove wildly towards the lines, but most were shattered by mortar fire well before they reached the trenches. The other Orks lucky enough to survive that far were shredded by repurposed Blitzen anti-aircraft fire. Bullets and Lasblasts tore the Orks apart, but still the lumbering Gargant continued its advance and in the wake of such a mechanical beast the defensive artillery shield provided by the Götterdämmerung Howitzers was all but useless.

"What is the situation Leftenant?" asked a Death Korps Officer as he stepped foot outside the command bunker to survey the battlefield in person through his gas mask and a pair of primitive binoculars, his grey trench coat blazing behind from the wind giving greater airs to the ornate gold trim of his officers chest tunic.

"Colonel Zollen, the Ork Gargant threatens to break our lines, and they will break. All the Watchmasters have agreed to hold the trenches to the last man in order to guarantee the successful withdraw of our Siegfried and Ragnarok Units under the command of the local PDF."

"What of Corporal Heinz Gärtner?" asked the Korps Officer as he put away his binoculars?

"The Corporal has yet to check in and report on the situation with the Colossus Cannon overlooking our left flank. We suspect that the Greenskins have cut him off and that he is most likely dead."

The Korps Officer chuckled, a rarity for warriors of such stoic grim nature, "Leftenant… of that I seriously doubt. I don't know if you have been informed, but the Corporal is the luckiest man alive."

"Lucky… sir?"

The Korps Officer looked at his subordinate and nodded curtly, "Yes Leftenant. Corporal Heinz Gärtner has served in four armies of conquest and participated in a grand total of thirty major land engagements, all without being wounded once. As if that wasn't enough he has also been a Grenadier four times. That man… is not dead… mark my words."

Both officers nodded, gave brisk salutes and prepared for the final Ork on-slot. This day would be there last for there was little that they could do against the enemy Gargant assuming the Colossus cannon overlooking the trenches was indeed out of operation. Even then, considering the range and shire armored gullet of the advancing Gargant, it would take one hell of a lucky shot to break the enemy momentum.

….

"Now let's see here… what did that manual say again?" said Corporal Heinz Gärtner as he stood atop the bluff overlooking the Death Korps siege lines. The view was stunning, with the gunfire and numerous explosions crushing stone and earth into a mesh of blackened dirt and green globs of flesh. There was no doubting that the Kriegmen were really bending the Orks over backwards with a vicious beating even with the slow advance of the Gargant towards the trenches.

Heinz was holding a crude schematic of the Colossus cannon, as expected the Orks had disassembled several of the components when they had taken the ridge. This was of course before the Corporal had stormed in with a Lucius Pattern Mk 22c Semi-Automatic Shotgun and killed nearly twenty of their number with his unique flare for arms. Even now, there green corpses littered the ground alongside numerous spent artillery shells and sandbags.

"OK, so first I have to insert this here, and then… right this should just about do it…" he said while using a wrench to screw in several bolts for the firing mechanism and alter several gyros for wind, height, and elevation. The total repair time had been three hours and despite the delays the cannon was at last operational. That having been said, there was a downside. The Orks had looted most of the mortar shells, except for a single long range timed delay charge. This was all he had to fire at the Gargant, one shot, a single shot against a giant mechanical beast. Even if he was lucky enough to hit the towering monster at such extreme range in all likelihood the shell would just bounce off and not pierce beneath the machine thick metal hide where it could do its real damage. Still, he had to do his part just like any Kriegman by putting the many before the one, Via Imperator.

Heinz used all his might to lift the shell into place and slam it home, a task that usually required four guardsmen, but given his stature such a task was easily accomplished by pushing the shell with his back until he reached the auto-loader from which once the ammunition was rolled down into its oblong holding basket the Colossus did the rest through hydraulics.

With care he used the swivels to turn the cannon towards the Gargant, held up his thump like an artist to measure distance, and hit the firing switch with his closed gloved fist.

The Colossus roared and jerked backwards, sending the man-sized artillery shell clear across the battlefield. At first it looked as though he would miss, a little to the left, a little to the right, and then the artillery shell hit home at the base of the Gargants neck echoing a resounding, 'DONG,' across the battlefield. The shell itself passed right through a weak spot in the armor and did not detonate due to its time delay charge.

"Wait for it…" he said, "Wait for it…"

…..

Inside the lumbering Gargant marching towards the Death Korps lines several green skins were fighting over a chicken leg when a giant hole was suddenly and unexpectingly blown through a nearby patchwork of metal plating. Whatever the object was, it drove a green gory path through four Orks, turning them into soggy fleshy paste that splashed upon the poorly welded walls. This object, an artillery shell bounced off of a steel bulkhead and started to roll down a flight of stairs echoing metallic thuds with every bounce until it passed through an opened doorway at the very bottom of the poorly crafted shaft and rolled gently to the feet of the Ork Warboss standing in front of a giant mound of ammunition. This warband leader looked down, surprised at the massive artillery shell, and more so at the words stenciled on its side, 'The Emperor Protects.'

Before the Warboss could respond, the world turned white as the timed delay charge on the artillery shell ignited. Seconds later, the giant mound of ammunition in the Gargants central chamber exploded into a hellish inferno that roared deeply inside the Ork creation. From the outside, a massive moan echoed across the battlefield as the Gargant halted its slow yet steady pace towards the Death Korps Lines. It was as if the machine had a stomach ache, more accurate than most knew at the time. Then, its head erupted with flames causing Orks to tumble out of burning eye sockets in order to escape the exploding ammunition.

Corporal Heinz Gärtner laughed and clapped his hands with glee as he watched the towering mechanical beast tilt sideways and collapse into a ruin of burning steel wreckage. What remained of the Orks started to withdraw from the engagement as Kriegmen in grey trench coats raised their Lasrifles in salute and roared with applause. They then topped the trenches in droves and pursued the Orks with a massed infantry counter attack. Even from Heinz's position he could make out Watchmasters with raised sabers motioned their men forward through the no-mans-land left behind from the prior vicious artillery bombardment.

"The bigger they are…" Heinz tilted his gas mask up to show his chapped lips before removing a cigar from his pack and lighting it, "The harder they fall…" gritting the Imho stick in his teeth with a wide smile, chuckling in amusement at the hell marry shot that had won the battle.


	2. Chapter 2

Heinz walked casually through the trenches back to the command bunker as the sounds of Lasfire became less and less frequent. It had taken less than a day to pacify the Orks after their Gargant and Warboss bad been defeated. In that time, the sons of Krieg had become something of an eerie novelty to the local PDF more because of their gas masks and solemn nature than anything else.

"Is that him," whispered a PDF guardsman, pointing at Heinz, "I think that it's him, the guy who took down the Gargant."

"Yeah, I've heard about that guy the, 'Immortal Heinz.' Those Krieg soldiers talk about him all the time. Once, I heard that he and his platoon were being evacuated by orders from a Commissar and his Valkyrie was shot down behind Tau lines."

"What happened?" still whispering amongst themselves.

"They say he alone survived, and without a scratch, that was before he then proceeded to systematically and single handedly butcher an entire Fire Warrior platoon with a trench knife."

"Bollocks, that can't be true."

Heinz stopped in brief reflection, remembering that event in black and white clarity as if it was yesterday. He remembered the Valkyrie taking a direct hit, the crash with all the fire and grinding metal, and then waking up with his boots off the ground from where he had been thrown free and his backpack had snagged on a tree limb. Unlike the rest of the men on that transport he had walked away without a single cut or bruise. As for the Fire Warriors, he distinctly remembered getting cornered by a Tau Hammerhead and a small squad of infantry. In an act of futility at what in the moment seemed like an apparent and imminent death, he threw his trench knife at the tank just before it opened fire. The knife, whether it be luck or coincidence got lodged into the tanks main barrel so that when the vehicle opened fire the cannon round detonated inside the tank killing not only the crew but also the escorting soldiers in a rather impressive explosion.

"That's nothing," whispered another PDF guardsman as Heinz walked by, "I heard from some Krieg soldiers that he once killed a Succubus with her own Vampire Blade."

Heinz reflected on that event as well. He remembered fighting some Eldar Xenos on a jungle world. One of them, a scantily clad woman in a leather bra, panty, boots, and gloves charged him with a glowing red sword. He reflexingly opened fire with his Lucius 88 Lasgun, but also stumbled backwards due to some loose branches that he was straddling for support. His shot went wide and he hit a nearby tree causing a limb to break loose and fall on the charging Eldar. The woman, to her credit, smiled and dodged left only to lose her footing on some logs and fall on her own sword. Since the blade was vampuric in nature and since she had been impelled through her abdomen, the weapon drained her to death.

"What about that other story, surely you've heard it? The one where he killed a Kroot warrior with a table spoon?"

Heinz chuckled to himself; he remembered that one was well, where the foul barbaric alien charged him with a large spear. The Kriegman recalled how he fired his Lasrifle out of reflex, but missed entirely. In those few second the Kroot managed to get within melee distance and swung his spear, but Heinz ducked just in time for the creature to only catch the top of his pack. In the aftermath of the near miss his pack emptied several random items including a small rations spoon which pitched up vertically into a patch of sand. Heinz then rolled out of the way and watched as the Kroot, due to its reverse jointed legs, fumble in the sand coming face firs t down upon the uprighted spoon, piercing its eye and killing it instantly.

"Will you guys quite… these are just stories. NOBODY is that lucky…"

There in lay the problem. Heinz WAS that lucky. He had always been that lucky. In battles where any normal human soldier would have died, something, some rare acts of providence, would intercede and prevent Heinz from dying. His… unique luck, had more than garnered the attention of his superiors to the point where they constantly sent him on missions with low survivability odds, even by Kriegman standards. What amazed his superiors was not that he survived, but also that he never once got wounded. In his long twenty-five year career Heinz had never been shot, stabbed, burned, poisoned, or otherwise maimed.

"I see that I chose the right man for the job aye Corporal," said Colonel Gruber, snapping Heinz out of his daze. The two Kriegman came within talking distance where Heinz delivered his brisk salute while clicking his heels.

"Yes sir."

Colonel Gruber delivered a slightly more relaxed salute and started to remove a small note from his breast pocket, "I've been holding this for you since yesterday. It came with the last off world mail run."

"What is it?" asked Heinz as he took the paper and unfolded it.

"You're being reassigned effective immediately. I wanted to make sure that you killed that Gargant before letting you leave the operations zone. I know that such a thing might seem petty, but… a lot of lives were riding on that shot you made."

"Departmento Munitorum, Corporal 579 Heinz Gärtner, reassigned… Inquisitor Rin…?" he read aloud, skimming through the letters contents, "Whose Inquisitor Rin?"

"I already checked up on that. Apparently, she's an odd one, fancies herself a bit of a collector of odd people like you. No offense."

"None taken," chuckled Heinz, "I am well aware of my reputation."

"Yes… your reputation," the Colonel looked at the wreckage of the demolished Gargant burning nearby, "I expect that it will soon grow even more. Well, it has truly been a pleasure Corporal. I would wish you the best of luck… but as we both know… you have no such shortage of the thing."

The two men gave brisk salutes and parted ways. Heinz was to travel to the planets spaceport and the Colonel to his men for a mop up operation against what remained of the Ork holdouts.


	3. Chapter 3

Heinz whistling mockingly as he stepped down the boarding plank from the incredibly ugly human freighter that had taken him to the Eldar craftwrold of Yme-Loc. The freighter, an awkward looking rusted hulk shaped like a stale red brick with its uniquely ornate gothic spires was moored between two Elder Eclipse-Class Cruisers. The two types of vessels looked like total opposites. The Eldar ships were lushly curved with golden solar sails fastened at rest while the human ship was lackluster in appearance with its crude fusion engines sparking blue radioactive flames out into space. While the Eldar ship was more appealing visually, it was also extremely vulnerable in comparison to human vessels rugged construction and authoritarian design. Even for a freighter the human vessel was pound for pound tougher than any Eldar counterpart, even if it was a visual train wreck.

"Let's see…" said the Kriegman as he stood off-ship, at the base of the boarding ramp, with an open map of the city. Numerous Eldar in bodygloves or ornate silk robes weaved by and around him as he continued to study the poorly drawn illustration of the Craftworld. This was a problem that most human visitors had when venturing into possibly the only Eldar Craftworld open to free trade. Free Trade, this unique phenomenon had long since been explained due to the Craftworlds isolation, both with and without the webway, from the rest of the Craftworlds. Indeed, of all the Craftworlds, Yme-Loc was highly dependent upon open trade with alien races in order to maintain its survival.

Everybody in the Sub Sector knew why, it wasn't a big secret. Yme-loc sat within a sector void of certain resources, namely H2O. Under normal circumstances a Craftworld would have enough resources already at hand to maintain a self sustaining ecosystem, but Yme-loc suffered uniquely when Slaanesh awoke. Unlike most Craftworlds that were either consumed or flug out far from the Eye of Terror, Yme-loc attempted to take in survivors fleeing from the fringe space between the Eye and the Material Universe. Unlike most Craftworlds that were too scattered and far flung, Yme-loc was close enough to the Chaos Rift to provide actual relief. Thus, a Craftworld designed for five hundred thousand inhabitants gained a population of three million, mostly refugees. Under normal circumstances such a population boom would cripple any self sufficient Craftworld, but the leaders of Yme-loc had a very forward thinking plan to accommodate the numerical surge. Thus Yme-loc became a major trading port with an entire area of its design reserved just for commerce. Here; Eldar, Tau, Orks, and even some rather blasphemous humans ventured forth from their many fortresses and settlements to trade openly with the Eldar.

At first the Imperium of Man was openly hostile towards the Eldar Craftworld because they viewed the open trade policies as a clear and blatant corruptive force from a foul Xenos race. It also didn't help that the Eldar free trade policies from Yme-loc created a flourishing Black Market within the Sub Sector from which numerous human planetary governors were able to recover vast arsenals of Tau, or worse, weaponry. Then there was the problem of currency? The human Throne Gelt had to compete against Ork Teeth while the Eldar and Tau refused to trade in anything but raw resources. Thus, a new currency and valuing system had to be put into place effective just for Yme-loc.

The new Eldar currency, which was funny because the currency was only useable on Yme-loc, was an intermediary means of trade between the numerous factions and it was called the Xephon. This Xephon had a fixed rate of exchange whose dependent value was based upon the cities reserves of H2O. The more H2O Yme-loc had the more valuable the currency became. Thus, the numerous races seeking to barter always made sure to keep the Craftworlds supplies set to their maximum in order to make sure that whatever amount of Xephon they held for open trade was also highly valued. For this very reason the Eldar also passed laws where trades through the intermediary currency could only occur on Yme-loc while making sure that they currency itself could never be mass duplicated leading to inflation. The Eldar always awarded contracts to supplies based upon who held the least amount of currency in order to maintain a happy balance between all the parties so that no one group could corner their markets.

The Imperium of Man, to its credit, fell back to Plan B. Rather than attempt to blockade the Craftworld and strangle it of trade; they would instead just pretend as if it didn't really exist. The Inquisition, while operating in the Sub Sector, would only stop ships smuggling arms and high value technology to and from Yme-loc while allowing free trade of raw resources. Yme-loc, which wanted resources only anyway, accepted the mutual understanding. Thus, a Black Market was quickly established and operated in which humans would attempt to purchase xenos technology against the mandates of the Inquisition. Even though the Inquisition was clearly unhappy with the Black Market and resulting flood of corruptive xenos technology, secretly they also contracted out secret weapons programs to the Adeptus Mechanicus. There in law a huge problem with the entire Sub Sector, everybody was playing dirty and nobody wanted to say anything because if one person caused trouble then everybody would be found out. Humans and Orks wanted powerful new weapons and technology, the Tau and Eldar wanted raw resources, and politically the Sub Sector Inquisition profited by grandstanding upon every smugglers vessel captured while Adeptus Mechanicus grew financially as it secretly built crude weapons that they sold to the Orks through Yme-loc for a huge markup.

"Hum…" said Heinz, his head and gas mask bobbing up and down behind the map, "I think it's this way…"

The Kriegman neatly folded the map and put it into his backpack before walking off into the crowd. Several men and women, mostly Eldar bumped into him or otherwise gave him an awkward stare, mostly because of his gas mask and trench coat. Then suddenly, he felt a tug at his pants leg. The human stopped and looked down to see a little Eldar girl in a small pink dress tugging at his trouser leg.

"You're big?" she said with a wide smile, followed instantly by pointing at his partially concealed trenching spade, "What's that?"

Heiz cocked his head to the side as he looked down at her. For a small alien child she possessed a rather amusing amount of cuteness, "That…" he said, pulling the spade out from under his coat, "is my trenching shovel."

"What is it used for?" she said, eyeing the small steel tool and its sharp edge with a hint of green paint on its tip.

"Oh well," he got down a single knee and started to talk to her, gas mask to face, "I use it to dig holes to hide in when people start shooting at me, or if I get really desperate… I use it as a weapon. I remember this one time an Ork tried to attack me and I just bopped him in the head, 'dong,' broken teeth went everywhere."

The little girl looked at him wide eyed and in awe before another more older Eldar woman with short red hair rushed over and forcefully grabbed her arm, "Dola!" she yelled, "Stay away from that filthy creature! You don't know where he's been!"

Heinz stood up and chuckled, "Quite alright…" he said, nodding, "You two be alright now…"

The Eldar watched, stunned more for his aloof response rather than him previously speaking to her daughter without first addressing the parent as is custom, and watched as he placed the trenching shovel back under his coat while walking off. Seconds later he had vanished into the crowded port leaving the mother and daughter stunned and feeling a little bit awkward.

"Mommy," she said, looking up at her mother, "Can I get a shovel and hit Orks with it?"

The mother looked down at her daughter with a sour facial expression. She had left her daughter out of sight for ten seconds, and that was all the time a single human needed to corrupt her young mind.

"No, no you cannot," she said bitterly, "Now go find Uncle Dolska."

The older Eldar woman now pointed her daughter in the direction of a nearby plaza, off the port, where their family likely lived. The little girl nodded and watched as her mother started to briskly walk away, her purple bodyglove catching at her ankles with every step.

"Mommy, where are you going?" asked the child.

"To find that human!" she replied angrily. The mother was going to make that foul creature pay dearly for attempting to corrupt her young daughters' mind. He would not just walk away from trying to make her child, into a… 'shoveler.' The very thought made her skin crawl with angst. No, he would pay dearly for this transgression.

…

Heinz toddled onto the docking pier where the Inquisitors Terran Cruiser was being fitted. He had to admit that it was a sight to behold. At the current moment, the Cruiser was covered in metal scaffolds, suspended in space with giant slabs of white material being fitted against a rather heavily reinforced hull. Numerous identical creatures were all wondering around the construction site all addressing one another with…

"Bellegar?"

"Bellegar."

"Bellegar?"

"Bellegar."

"Bellegar?"

"Bellegar."

It was oddly comical to the Kriegman as he continued past a series of shipping containers labeled in strange alien letters. And, so he started to walk towards a man, a Tech Priest, dressed in a red robe and hooded face currently speaking to a Tau Engineer suddenly a rather loud voice boomed behind him.

"YOU!"

The Kriegman turned to see the same Eldar woman as earlier with short red hair and a purple bodyglove stalking towards him from across the construction warf. She was angry, very angry, and it was then that one of the scaffolds tore loose from the Cruiser and started to tumble towards the pier.

The Kriegman looked up and saw the wreckage descending, twirling, sharding into fragmented pieces. The Eldar woman, she was so angry, so directed at him that she wasn't paying attention to the real danger. Heinz reacted, it didn't matter if she was a Xeno, she was still a civilian.

He ran towards her, racing against the descent of construction debris falling through space. The woman was at first surprised at his reaction, and then horrified as she looked up to see the real threat. Despite being physically superior with her adrenaline system, she froze, unable to move.

In those few precious seconds, time seemed to slow, until somebody, large and strong, grabbed her. And then everything fell back into place as twenty tons of metal debris landed all around her. In an instant she smelled sweat and rubbed, her face was touching against… a gas mask? The human was holding her, and… she took in her surroundings. The debris had formed a neat circle directly around them in a giant wrecked mound.

The human let her go and stepped back, "I'm OK!" he yelled, waving at the Tech Priest. The surprised cyborg returned the gesture… somewhat… drained of enthusiasm and surprised.

The Eldar looked at him, her anger gone. Her knees wobbled and then… Heinz watched as she started to cry. She then leapt forward and plowed into him, causing them both to fall to the ground. She wouldn't stop crying and Heinz felt awkward the more she latched onto his grey trench coat.

Suddenly, another woman was standing before him, directly over him casting a shadow over his body, she was human and dressed in a black suit and tie, with long black hair down her back and a pair of glasses before her eyes, "Corporal, you're late."

The Eldar woman continued to cry into his coats chestclothe as Bellegar strolled in from the side, noting the circle of debris formed in an exact circle around the Kriegman, "How… is this possible? You should be dead?"


End file.
